Penny Marshall - Early Life

Early Life

Carole Penny Marshall was born in St. Vincent's Hospital, New York City to Marjorie Irene (née Ward), a tap dance teacher who ran the Marjorie Marshall Dance School, and Anthony "Tony" Masciarelli, later Marshall, a director of industrial films and later a producer. She is the sister of actor/director/TV producer Garry Marshall and Ronny Hallin, a television producer. Her birth name Carole was selected because her mother's favorite actress was Carole Lombard.

Her father was of Italian descent, his family having come from Abruzzo, and her mother was of English and Scottish descent; her father changed his last name from Masciarelli to Marshall before Penny was born. Religion played no role in the Marshall children's lives. Garry Marshall was christened Episcopalian, Ronny was Lutheran, and Penny was confirmed in a Congregational church, because "... other sent us anyplace that had a hall where she could put on a recital. If she hadn't needed performance space, we wouldn't have bothered."

She grew up at 3235 Grand Concourse, the Bronx, a street that also spawned Neil Simon, Paddy Chayefsky, Calvin Klein, and Ralph Lauren. She began her career as a tap dancer at age three, and later taught tap at her mother's dance school. She graduated from Walton High School and attended the University of New Mexico. In 1967, she moved to Los Angeles to join her older brother Garry Marshall, a writer whose credits at the time included TV's The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961–1966).